The present invention concerns a novel coin-operated phonograph having an electronic display of information that is useful to the customer and operator.
Coin-operated phonographs typically comprise a cabinet which houses means for playing selected records and a mechanism for detecting the customer's selection, for locating the selected record and for positioning the selected record and playing means relatively for playing of the selected record. It is conventional for title strips to be displayed on the front panel of the cabinet. On older coin-operated phonographs, a selection button is often located immediately adjacent each title strip. In many coin-operated phonographs, particularly the newer types, each of the title strips contains a code number relating to the particular record, and in order to make a selection the customer enters the code number by pressing coded selector buttons that are not positioned adjacent each title strip.
The typical coin-operated phonograph provides a relatively small amount of information to the customer. We have discovered a system by which a relatively large amount of useful information can be presented to a customer and/or operator. For example, by utilizing the present invention the capability may be provided to present to the customer the time of day, the selection being played, the selection being entered by the customer, the amount of credit remaining, the top 10 records, the new records for the week or month, etc. The system may have the capability of being programmed to present a large amount of useful information to the operator. For example, the system may display to the operator the top 20 selections, the bottom 20 selections, the total number of plays, the cash box contents, etc.
In addition to the foregoing, the present invention obviates the need for title strips and may present a display that is attractive to the customer, highly informative to the customer and operator, and thus conducive to greater use of the coin-operated phonograph.